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Pop quiz:
Is the proportion of American children suffering from the disease known as
attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder . . .
a) Less
than 5%, as we believed before the early 1990s?
b) More
than 11%, and rising, as suggested by CDC statistics?
c) Zero?
The correct
answer is (c), says neurologist Richard Saul in his forthcoming book, “ADHD
Does Not Exist: The Truth About Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder”
(HarperWave), which is sure to cause controversy when it comes out in February.
After a long
career treating patients complaining of such problems as short attention spans
and an inability to focus, Saul is convinced that ADHD is a collection of
symptoms, not a disease, and shouldn’t be listed in the American Psychiatric
Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual.
Treating
ADHD as a disease is a huge mistake, according to Saul. Imagine walking into a
doctor’s office with severe abdominal pains and simply being prescribed
painkillers. Then you walk away, pain-free. Later you die of appendicitis.
Patients
show up at the clinic with their own ADHD diagnoses these days, simply because
ADHD is in the air all around us — and because they want to score some
delightful drugs like Adderall or Ritalin, or because their parents want an
easy way to get them to sit down and shut up.
Adderall
and Ritalin are stimulants, though, and the more you take them the more you
develop a tolerance for them, which can lead to a dangerous addiction spiral.
The term
attention deficit disorder was made official in 1980, when it appeared in that
year’s edition of the DSM (the label changed to ADHD seven years later).
Subsequent editions have steadily loosened the definition, and diagnoses have
skyrocketed accordingly — from 7.8% in 2003 to 9.5% in 2007 to 11% in 2011. That’s
one in nine children, two-thirds of them boys, who are being slapped with the
ADHD label. Two-thirds of these children have been prescribed a stimulant.
“ADHD makes
a great excuse,” Saul notes. “The diagnosis can be an easy-to-reach-for crutch.
Moreover, there’s an attractive element to an ADHD diagnosis, especially in
adults — it can be exciting to think of oneself as involved in many things at
once, rather than stuck in a boring rut.”
In private
practice, Saul found himself wondering, what other problems do these patients
have besides being easily distracted? One girl he treated, it turned out, was
being disruptive in class because she couldn’t see the blackboard. Correct
diagnois: myopia. She needed glasses, not drugs.
A
36-year-old man who complained about his addiction to online games and guessed
he had ADHD, it turned out, was drinking too much coffee and sleeping only four
to five hours a night. Correct diagnosis: sleep deprivation. He needed blackout
shades, a white-noise machine and a program that shut all his devices off at
midnight.
A young man
who asked, “Can’t you just ask me a few questions and write me a prescription?”
simply left the office when Saul started probing too deeply into whatever was
ailing him.
One by one,
nearly all of Saul’s patients turned out to have some disease other than ADHD,
such as Tourette’s, OCD, fragile X syndrome (a genetic mutation linked to
mental retardation), autism, fetal alcohol syndrome, learning disabilities or
such familiar conditions as substance abuse, poor hearing or even giftedness. A
boy who was disruptive and inattentive in math class (but no other) was,
simply, bored by the material and needed to be advanced a grade to regain his
concentration.
In a few
cases, there was simply no diagnosis. One adult who thought she had ADHD and
had been prescribed stimulants by another doctor got a different take from
Saul. He advised her to instead return to her habit of exercising regularly and
cut back on work hours.
“I now
realize it wasn’t ADHD,” she told him later, pleased with the progress she made
as a result. “It was just life.”
The
explosion in ADHD diagnoses and related prescriptions of stimulants is not
without substantial costs. Potentially addictive drugs are not to be given out
like Skittles.
“I know of
far too many colleagues,” Saul writes, “who are willing to write a prescription
for a stimulant with only a cursory examination of the patient, such as the
‘two-minute checklist,’ for ADHD.”
Two minutes
to jot down a prescription may lead to years of consequences: short-term side
effects of stimulants include loss of sleep, increased anxiety, irritability
and mood problems. Over the long term, use of these drugs can lead to unhealthy
weight loss, poor concentration and memory, even reduced life expectancy or
self-destructive behaviors not excluding suicide.
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Question: I’ve been
working with young children for many years as a first- and second-grade teacher
near Toronto, Canada. I have yet to clearly see any of the characteristics
attributed to the Indigo Children. Is it possible that Indigo behavior
manifests differently nearer the Poles?
Answer: Dear one,
this is indeed so. The energy of magnetics is very different in certain colder
areas near the Poles, and we have indicated this in past channellings. In
addition, your area is magnetically different—even from the western areas of
your
own
country. All of this changes the potential consciousness of Humans, should they
wish to give intent for it. Do you think it’s a coincidence that the equator
carries such
a dark
potential in so many areas of Humanity? There hasn’t been much Human thought on
this.
You have
Indigos in your classes, but what is different is that the area where you live
is more attuned for the parents to know how to intuitively raise them. Remember
the axiom of the Indigo: Their seemingly difficult behavior patterns are in
direct relationship to their home and school environments. Indigos are not
difficult when they are honored and given choice. You do this intuitively in
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Blessed are
those who are passionate for the children of Earth, for they understand that
they are children as well.
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